This is the third in a five-part series on surfers’ health. The first columns in the series can be found online at www.coastnewsgroup. com.

I was living in Hawaii in the mid-1960s when a friend asked me to dinner and I had my first completely vegetarian meal. My host was convinced that eating and smoking organic substances would add “years to his life and life to his years,” as he put it. Not being persuaded by his bumper-sticker philosophy, I thanked him for the food, passed on the smoke and left early, unfulfilled by the tasteless meal. Then I drove to Chuck’s Steakhouse, a popular spot in Waikiki where for a few bucks you could grill your own meat.

From that time forward, vegetarianism has regularly presented itself to me, and while I like the idea of not eating animals because they don’t eat me (something that could also be applied to vegetables) I have never been fully converted to that sort of diet. Along with the concept of a meat-free meals came various health therapies — stretching, which is great for surfers of all levels; fasting, which I hate but do on rare occasions for both health and spiritual reasons; and massage and chiropractic, which I have benefited from each time they’ve been applied to me. While these have remained part of my life, I have also experimented with reflexology and Rolfing with various degrees of success.

Still, I had never seen so many “alternative” health therapies practiced under one roof as I did March 16 at Ada Harris School in Encinitas where men and women, most of whom were in middle age and beyond, set up tables for the purpose of demonstrating various methods that promised to regain or improve health for those willing to try them. The “Health Enlightenment Expo” was free to the public. Once inside, I quickly made the rounds and met a woman who had a variety of stones for healing. Across from her sat a “spiritual cosmetologist” who also painted celestial landscapes and practiced aura reading.

I stopped to check out the ICap Meter, where thoughts are electronically monitored through a computer program attached to a headband. The idea here is the encouragement of positive thoughts and the elimination of negative ones, something that would be useful for surfing, or for most San Diego residents, especially during football season.

Reflexology proved calming and Hawaiian Power Flow got my blood moving in the right direction. I tried a quick blast of Mangosteen, one of the new super food drinks. It gave me a little lift, tasted good and left me wondering if it could live up to its claims of help for everything from allergies to diabetes.

The Yoga rugs were nice, but I was more interested in Barefoot Connections, where a sheet purported to reconnect its users to the surface of the earth, while promising improved energy, improved sleep, relief of muscle tension, reduced stress and normal biological rhythms, was being demonstrated. The sheets had yet to be electrified, so I wandered on.

To be honest, I was unsure of many of the items I scanned, thinking, however, that some had merit and a few would benefit the mainstream in years to come. Feeling a bit lightheaded and weak, which I later discovered was the symptoms of a cold I was getting, I left early. I get a lot of colds frequently, try nearly all natural therapies put in front of me, eschew pills, and find that nothing works better than extra sleep and fluids, something most of our parents suggested years ago.\